Shipping costs, labor for material handling, and just-in-time manufacturing have awakened a need for simplified and flexible means to transport retail and commercial products from manufacturers and distributors to sales outlets and retail stores in the most economical ways available. Innovative cradle-to-grave transportation can provide the critical percentages that mark the difference between success and failure.
Big-box stores have access to custom-manufactured products such as “rolltainers” and various other wire-constructed, multi-use, material-handling units that are designed to the retailers specific requirements (i.e., dimensional limits that accommodate pre-existing pallet sizes, turning radii, door passage sizes, etc.) so that units can be packed with product, packed into semi-trailers, unloaded to a shipping dock and wheeled onto the retail floor.
Smaller retail outlets seeking similar units must either design and manufacture their own custom units (and assume the R&D, prototyping, and production costs), adapt to the pre-set requirements of a big-box store (and purchase their units, if available)—possibly requiring modifications to aisle sizes, passageways and shipping containers—or forego the potential advantages of the multi-use material-handling units.
There is clearly a need for a modular rolling pallet system that can be constructed to a user's specifications from easily available materials and utilized to transport and display a wide variety of product types.